A Modern Orwell

In a recent post I commented on a piece by a blogger who posts under the name of Scott Alexander. I have now read quite a lot of his posts and find both them and him fascinating. He is someone who identifies more nearly with the left than with the right but can be ferociously (and intelligently and entertainingly) critical of aspects of left wing culture. He is sufficiently open to ideas he does not agree with to offer a brilliant, even persuasive, summary of reactionary arguments. He is interested in a very wide range of subjects and says intelligent things about all of them

Start with the page of top posts. It includes a grim and persuasive description of why the worst place in the world to die is a hospital—he is a doctor. It includes evidence of how hard it is to do scientific research right and how frequently we do it wrong. Also a description and defense of Polyamory. And a great many other things.

All of them, so far, worth reading.

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P.S. Reading more of Alexander's posts, I came across a paragraph in one of them that struck me as a nice example of his writing style:

Tables 10 and 11 turn out to be a gold mine – I worried the records of exactly who took the tests would be lost, but as you might expect of someone who basically invented statistics single-handedly and then beat Darwin in a debate about evolution as an encore, Galton was very good at keeping careful data.